Hardt and Negri’s ‘Empire’ is heralded as the most successful work of political theory to come from the left for a generation.
For Hardt and Negri, the modern forces of globalization, transnational capital, and the world market have led to the deterioration of the sovereignty the nation-state, which has been replaced by a supranational force, ‘Empire’.
Will Obama be able to satisfy the desires of the Israel lobby, his constituency, and the State of Israel sufficiently enough to avoid harming his reelection campaign?
In post-conflict environments, the peace achieved is often unstable, facing a wide range of risks which can force a return to violence. The immediate post-conflict stage can be a negative peace, in which whilst overt physical violence may have ended, other political, social, economic and cultural factors that adversely affect human opportunities and quality of life may persist.
The United States’ decision to launch a preventive attack on Iraq in 2003 resulted in significant international resentment, plummeting approval ratings of the Bush administration and domestic disenchantment which manifested itself with subsequent election results. This was exacerbated by failure to find weapons of mass destruction, the mistreatment of prisoners in the Abu Ghraib prison, and the problematic occupation.
Several scholars have emphasised the apparent ‘Eurocentricity’ of modern international law and have hence argued that its development has been “a European story”. Is the realm of international law like a play that is being performed, in which the Western or European states are the actors on stage and their colonies, the Third World states, are only the spectators who are affected by what is happening on stage but do not have any real possibility of participating?
Realists do have a more pessimistic approach to the study of international relations than liberal internationalists, but should not be denounced as being overwhelmingly bitter about it.
The proposition that democratic states do not fight interstate wars against each other is one of the most influential ideas in international politics in recent years. Since 1974 eighty-five authoritarian regimes have ended. Yet of these, only thirty states have survived as fairly stable democracies. It seems the shift away from dictatorial rule towards a form of governance offering a more liberal and democratic stance has not always concluded with the construction of peaceful domestic and international relations
A narrow application of Article 51 would allow keeping control on unilateral use of force, at least given the awareness by states of the political costs of unlawful actions. Widening the scope of self-defence could bring the erosion of the basic purpose of the UN Charter regime, i.e. the ban of military force in inter-state relations and the promotion of peace.
Cooperation between the media and intelligence agencies is crucial in order to make intelligence more effective, ensure public and national security, and react to new threats.
Do international organizations act for the maintenance of international peace, or are they little more than guarantors of the interests of powerful states?
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